Britain hopes to make "significant progress" to resolve the issue of the Border post-Brexit by June but has until October to finalise a deal on the overall withdrawal, the UK's cabinet office minister has said.
On a visit to the Border region, David Lidington, Britain's de facto deputy prime minister, said London was "very determined" that there should be progress by the next EU summit at the end of June but that the Brexit treaty as a whole, including the Irish issue, needed to be completed by October.
"We should aim to make significant progress in June. Let's devote all our energies to that: no hard border on the island of Ireland, no customs border on the Irish Sea," he told reporters after meeting businesspeople from the local chamber of commerce in Newry.
Differences of opinion have emerged between the EU and the UK on the pace of progress on the unresolved issue of how to avoid a hard border after the UK leaves the EU and around deadlines in Brexit talks.
The UK's Brexit secretary, David Davis, said on Wednesday he regarded June as an "artificial deadline" for agreement on the so-called backstop, the emergency default position effectively keeping Northern Ireland under EU economic rules post-Brexit in the absence of another option.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said on Thursday it was essential that there be "real and solid progress by June" on a solution to the Border question and that, without it, there can be no overall Brexit deal.
‘Strategic’ prize
Mr Lidington sounded a more conciliatory and constructive note on his visit to Co Down saying that all parties needed “to keep our eyes on the strategic prize”.
“It is really important that we focus all our energies on ensuring no hard border on the island of Ireland and no border, no customs border to trade in the Irish Sea,” he said.
Asked about Mr Varadkar’s remarks that the biggest barrier to a deal was the UK’s “very, very hard red lines”, the Conservative MP said that London had put forward “a number of ideas for negotiation” and that officials were working every week “to go through the nitty-gritty of those proposals issue by issue”.
Mr Lidington, a former shadow Northern Ireland secretary of state from 2003 to 2007, said “good progress” had been made on maintaining the Common Travel Area covering freedom of travel between the UK and Ireland after Brexit, on equalities and human rights, and on the single energy market.
